Active blended learning to improve students’ motivation in computer programming courses: A case study

Abstract

Difficulties faced by novice students in programming subjects have been a concern for researchers in computer science education since the early 1960s. Usually a programming module is taught in the first semester of a computer science curriculum, so such challenges affect student motivation and attitudes toward the entire discipline; some of them drop out of the field, and many of them continue but with fear of programming tasks in subsequent courses. Although the various difficulties of learning programming are caused by different reasons, motivating students represents an important factor that helps them overcome these challenges. In this chapter, we describe our case study of designing and implementing a blended learning environment to enhance student motivation in a computer programming course at Qatar University during the 2012 fall semester. The main objective was to actively engage students in the learning process inside and outside the classroom to enhance their motivation and improve their learning of computer programming. We have designed and implemented a blended learning environment that supports collaborative learning, provides a high level of interaction between learners and the instructor, provides students with timely feedback, and supports students’ reflective practice. To evaluate the effectiveness of our approach, we compared the performance of students who were involved in this learning environment (the treatment group) to other students (the control group) who received the regular class experience. As an indirect assessment, we surveyed students in the treatment group to assess their attitudes about their experience. The results show that our approach has a positive impact on student motivation and performance.